Always a fascinating topic! I recently was having a very similar discussion with my wife about Wordle. Let's say I've got it narrowed down to three words. For my next guess I can try one of those, but if it's not right it doesn't help narrow it down at all. Or I can guess a word I know is wrong, but guarantees that my next guess will be right. Which do you go with? And if you've only got two guesses left does that change your answer?
I think this feeds into much of the same 'what do you consider victory' question.
Another example is semi-cooperative games, where 'all players lose' is a possible outcome. Some players will rate the outcomes (from best to worst) as:
> I win
> Someone else wins
> Everyone loses
But others will rank them as:
> I win
> Everyone loses
> Someone else wins
If all players don't agree on these rankings the game will break down. As a designer you can hint about which you want through theme or setting, or just saying explicitly. But there are no guarantees.
Always a fascinating topic! I recently was having a very similar discussion with my wife about Wordle. Let's say I've got it narrowed down to three words. For my next guess I can try one of those, but if it's not right it doesn't help narrow it down at all. Or I can guess a word I know is wrong, but guarantees that my next guess will be right. Which do you go with? And if you've only got two guesses left does that change your answer?
I think this feeds into much of the same 'what do you consider victory' question.
Another example is semi-cooperative games, where 'all players lose' is a possible outcome. Some players will rate the outcomes (from best to worst) as:
> I win
> Someone else wins
> Everyone loses
But others will rank them as:
> I win
> Everyone loses
> Someone else wins
If all players don't agree on these rankings the game will break down. As a designer you can hint about which you want through theme or setting, or just saying explicitly. But there are no guarantees.
Thank you for this. It reminds me of the Ursula K. Le Guin line, "How you play is what you win."